How Did She Get Here?
by River Eagle
Summary: Based off a song - The Doctor starts to see 'Bad Wolf' and Rose Tyler through his adventures with the Ponds, which complicates his relationship with River Song. The question is, how did Rose Tyler get to Earth Prime, when the Doctor knew he left her in Pete's World with his meta-crisis? AU season 6 onward.
1. Prologue

How Did She Get Here? – a _Doctor Who_ fanfiction by River Eagle.

Characters:

Bad Wolf/Rose Tyler, 11th Doctor, River Song, Clara Osward, 12th Doctor, Jack Harkness, 10th Doctor Duplicate, Amy Pond, Rory Williams (plus others)

Songfic – Based on Cliff Richard's "How did she get here" song. Starting Season 6 "The Impossible Astronaut."

**Prologue**

The Doctor dropped his gaze from the time rotor as both Amy Pond and River Song disappeared beneath the control deck. He shifted his gaze to Rory, and asked, "Rory; is everybody cross with me for some reason?"

"I'll find out," Rory replied.

The Doctor watched the man leave the control deck. He knew that the Roman wouldn't return with a straight answer. There weren't a lot of those going around at the moment. How the Doctor hated River's continued "Spoilers" comment to anything that he asked. What had he done in the future to deserve the distain he sensed coming his way from all three of his companions? He could hear a hushed conversation happening below his feet and knew he could listen in to what they were saying. Perhaps he'd learn something about what had scared them. But he knew he wouldn't. Timelines and all that rot.

He rubbed his cheek from where River had slapped him. It didn't hurt anymore, and though he had said that he was looking forward to seeing what made him deserve the slap, he really wasn't. Pursing his lips, he tried taking a deep breath to calm himself down. How long were they going to be discussing him without him present?

Sticking his head over the edge of the glass floor, he growled, "I'm being extremely clever up here and there's no one to stand around looking impressed. What's the point of having you all?" He disappeared again while River shook her head.

The three of them made their way back to the main level of the control hub while the Doctor pranced around, mainly just talking to fill in the awkward tension while he tried to work out what to do. Was he really going to answer the summons or just take them back to where they were supposed to be? He eventually stopped and went to sit in the jump seat. Resting his forehead on his hand, he crossed his legs. River moved around the console so she could have a good look at the Time Lord.

She knew that this wouldn't be easy. She knew trying to get the Doctor to do anything would require a lot of patience on her part, as well as her parents' part – not that Amy and Rory knew that fact yet

As if the Doctor knew she was looking at him, he removed his hand from his face. "What?" he snapped, throwing his hand out. "A mysterious summons? You think I'm just going to go? Who sent those messages?" He stared down River Song, but she didn't answer. Turning his attention to Amy and Rory, he knew they knew who sent them. "I know you know. I can see it in your faces. Don't play games with me. Don't ever, ever think you're capable of that."

"You're going to have to trust us this time," River said.

"Trust you? Sure," the Doctor cut her off. He didn't even really know her. Why would he trust her? He stood up, and got into River's face. "But first of all, Doctor Song, just one thing. Who are you?" He waited for her to answer, yet he knew that she wouldn't answer him. Not now. All she'd say would be 'spoilers'. He hated that word. And hated how he had to wait to find out who exactly River Song was to him – and why she knew his name. "You're someone from my future, guessing that, but who?" The Doctor took a side glance at the Ponds before looking back at who he assumed was his future wife. He controlled his urge to shudder. She remained silent, so he asked her the other burning question he had. "Okay, why are you in prison? Who did you kill? Hmm?" This time he didn't even wait for River to answer, even though she flinched at the question. Okay, that was interesting – must have just happened recently for her. "Now I love a bad girl me, but trust you? Seriously?"

"You should. River knows what's at stake here, Doctor." That voice – one from so long before, froze both hearts of the Time Lord. He didn't want to turn his gaze from River's face to the other side of the console – to where he assumed a hologram would be playing. What else would it be? But when the voice didn't continue, he knew he would have to confront his past.

"Who is that?" Amy whispered to Rory. Both of them had moved around the column to look at the hologram playing by the TARDIS. River moved to the red head's side. The archaeologist opened her mouth then closed it again. She wasn't 100% sure who it was, but could she could venture a guess.

The Doctor looked fully at the hologram and asked, "How?"

The hologram smiled sadly. "Hello, my Doctor. I saw this day coming, and knew you needed someone to trust. So trust me when I say that this day is a fixed point in time. You need to go to Washington, Doctor. You need to find Canton Everett Delaware III." The pre-recorded figure looked down, and then back into where she thought the Doctor would be. "My Doctor. This path is set before you. There is no way to change it. And you know what will happen if you try." The Doctor swallowed and nodded, even though his pink and yellow girl could not see. How did she know about his stint as 'Time Lord Victorious?' "Be brave, my Doctor, and I'm sorry. I'm so sorry things are going to change very soon for you."

The blonde blinked a few times before turning her head in the direction where the Doctor's three companions were standing. "River Song, the path you walk is the hardest of them all, and you wonder if you have the strength to walk it at all. Remember the days that you have with them. Both the days gone and the days to come. Their love will keep you strong. Look after him."

River nodded at the hologram, not sure how this mysterious woman knew about her, and her mixed up relationship with the Doctor and her parents. She frowned at the familiarity that the woman had with her.

"Amy and Rory. You are brilliant, the pair of you. For putting up with him. Be brave, the pair of you. I know how much you want to tell him what's going on, but you can't. He needs to live it."

The blonde's attention returned to the Doctor. Her voice hardened. "And if you dare ask them what's happening, Doctor, I will have River slap you to hell and back. If you need further proof that you need to go – I was the one who sent you those messages. Trust me, my Doctor. I will see you in 1969." She then gave the tongue and cheek smile the Doctor was accustomed to seeing from her. And then, her image flickered and was gone. The Doctor moved his hand up to rest it where the phantom cheek would have been. He'd forgotten – in all the years since his regeneration, he'd forgotten how much she'd meant to him. How much she'd filled the void since his people died. How much he'd loved her. He blinked and moistened his lips. She'd asked him to go – told him he'd see her there. Of course he'd go. Now. Fixing a smile on his face, he turned back to his three companions.

"Doctor," Amy asked. "Who was that?"

"Doesn't matter," the Doctor shot back. "What matters is Canton III. Who's he?"

River moved to the scanner and started looking up information.

**HDSGH**

"The President asked her where she was, and like any lost little girl, she looked out the window." The Doctor moved to the window and looked out at the street signs. The little girl was around here somewhere, he knew. And there, he stopped. It didn't matter who Canton Everett Delaware III was, it didn't matter that there was a lost little girl out there somewhere and he had to find her, and it certainly didn't matter that he was in 1969, the year of the moon, with Amy, Rory and River. Nothing really mattered now that his gaze was fixed, not on the street signs, but on the woman beneath them.

"Streets!" Amy said in the background, but he hardly heard her. Leaning against the post beneath the street signs was a blonde – and it wasn't just any blonde. It was _his_ blonde. "Of course, it was street names." The Doctor turned slightly to see River looking worriedly at him. He could sense her worry. But he couldn't really seem to bring himself to care. Looking back out the window, he saw that the woman was gone.

How could she be here? Now? The last time he saw Rose Tyler, actually properly saw her, was when he dropped her off in the parallel world, with his meta-crisis.

Snapping his attention to the here and now, the Doctor said, "The only place in Florida, probably the only place in all of America where those three streets are on the same junction." He turned to look fully at River Song. If it was any normal day of running into this woman, he may have flirted a bit, but not this day. Not when he'd been first shaken by seeing a recording of Rose Tyler in the TARDIS (he knew that he could explain that one away, somehow) but to have her show up in Florida, 1969, of all places scared him. He knew he'd never brought her here. So how on earth did she get there? "Why are you looking at me like that?" he snapped.

River tried not to look hurt. She was getting used to seeing a version of the Doctor who knew less about her the more she knew him; but each time she ran into a younger Doctor, it still hurt. "What's wrong with you today, Sweetie? Who was that woman?" She hated the fact the Doctor didn't ever seem to fully trust her. It seemed like he never did. He'd never told her about the woman in the hologram – the one he acted like was a ghost. And it hurt that all that the other woman had to do was say 'trust me'. She could never do that with any version of the Doctor. He never even bought himself to tell her his name. She shook her head, and pushed past him.

"Her name was Rose," he admitted quietly, just as she moved past him. She stopped and looked into his sad green eyes. "And I lost her."

And even though he tried to hide it, River finally saw the truth – the truth that his hearts never really belonged to her. She continued passed him, trying to hold in her tears, feeling hurt and betrayed.

"River," he added, just as softly as before, even though he knew that the moment between them was slipping away. The Doctor looked down and then back up into her gaze. He knew that she was only barely holding it together. "It's complicated."

"Isn't it always?" She averted her gaze. "We've got work to do."

**HDSGH**

The two of them tried to put on a brave face for the others, and for the most part they succeeded. By avoidance. The Doctor was good at that. And River, she knew that if she confronted the Doctor again so soon after him snapping at her, she would lose what semblance of control she had. Neither really knew what it would take for them to get back to the flirting – goodness, how River missed that, their friendly banter, and the underlining tension that was present every time she met a younger version of her beloved husband. It was a good thing that they had three months apart to really think about what they wanted from their mixed up, opposite direction, relationship.

The Doctor tried hard to forget what he'd seen in Florida. Especially with what he knew to be the truth: River was his future, and Rose Tyler, the Bad Wolf, was his past. And after three months of not doing anything (pure torture in a Time Lord's mind) he had sorted through his confusing feelings for River and tried to put his past behind him.

And once they went to rescue Amy, the two of them fell back into the rhythm of teasing and flirting with each other. The Doctor was glad of that. What was unexpected though was when he was dropping River off at Storm Cage. Whatever had affected her mood back in Florida had all but gone, and she snogged him. Properly, fully snogged him.

"Right…" he said, pulling away from her. "Okay. Interesting."

River's face dropped, and she pulled back further. "What's wrong? You act as though we haven't done that before."

"We haven't." He gave her a charming smile.

Again, she got a sinking feeling in her heart. If he hadn't ever kissed her before, then she had just claimed her last kiss from him. "We haven't?"

The Doctor knew this could go one of two ways: he could walk away now and leave River with a broken heart, or he could try mending whatever was left of their strange relationship. He saw in her eyes the pain of his apparent lack of recognition and was fully going to make an excuse to walk away. And then he did something unexpected; he leaned in and pressed his forehead against hers. "River," he whispered. "Please, be patient. I want this with you."

She gave him a shaky smile. "Sweetie, my past is your future. Of course you'll have this with me. But I won't have it with you. Not anymore."

"What if I can change that?"

"Don't you dare! You watch us run." River cupped his cheek. "And I will see you again."

"My past, your future," the Doctor returned. "Why does this have to be so complicated?"

"That's the way this is, Sweetie. And I wouldn't change it for the world. Now go, you have many adventures with me yet."

The Doctor pulled away from River and moved to his TARDIS. Turning back to take one last look at the incarcerated woman, he smiled. "Until next time, Doctor Song. Let's make it a good one." He disappeared into the TARDIS, leaving behind a desolate woman.


	2. Part One

**Part One**

The Doctor pursed his lips after dropping off Cleaves and Dicken. It had been four months since they had left 1969, and he could feel the stares of both Amy and Rory on him. His mind was elsewhere, though, trying to fill in the gaps as to what had happened in Utah, and when 'they' – whoever 'they' were – took Amy. And there was the matter that the two Ponds were hiding from him. And he knew it was about his future. Why else would both River and Rose warn him, of all people, not to ask questions? They both knew foreknowledge was dangerous.

And then there were the words that kept following him. The words from his past that he tried burying and forgetting; but they kept on coming back. Kept on showing up at specific times throughout his last few regenerations – ever since he first met Rose Tyler so many years ago. Back when he was all big ears and leather.

"Are you okay?" Amy asked, breaking his concentration.

"Breathe Pond," the Doctor said seriously. "Remember? I said breathe."

Amy frowned. "Why do you keep tellin' me to breathe?" She doubled over before the Doctor could say anything else.

Rory rushed to her side. "What's wrong with her, Doctor?"

The Doctor's eyes flickered to the door Cleaves and Dicken had disappeared through. The words that were there before had been replaced by 'Bad Wolf'. He returned his attention back to Amy and Rory. "Get her into the TARDIS." Setting his jaw, he strode ahead and entered his brilliant machine first. Why were the words showing up now, of all times? "Breathe, Pond," the Doctor snapped out as he heard the TARDIS door close behind them.

"Doctor, what is happening to her?" Rory demanded.

"Contractions."

The last time he saw 'Bad Wolf' was with Donna, just after she had that parallel word created around her. That time was a message to him telling him that Rose was coming back. Rose… Could she possibly be coming back?

But that was impossible.

"Contractions?" Rory echoed.

"She's going into labour." The Doctor was proud of his ability to split his concentration in two, yet he knew he had to focus on one right now. Forcing his mind on the here and now, he turned back to Rory and Amy, and explained exactly what was happening and why the three of them had ended up at the factory with the flesh in the first place. Raising his screwdriver at Amy, he looked the flesh square in the eye. "We are coming for you, Amy. No matter what it takes, remember: we will find you."

Rory looked blankly at the place Amy had been standing. "What just happened?"

"I'm sorry Rory. We will find your wife. And your child." He looked stoic. Rory sank to the steps where the remains of Amy's flesh avatar had been. The Doctor watched him sadly for a few moments. Taking a deep breath, he turned to the command consol. "Come on," he whispered to the rotor. "Let's get going, Old Girl."

**HDSGH**

The Doctor left Demon's Run on his own. When he worked out exactly who River Song was, and what Madam Kovarian wanted with baby Melody Pond, he needed to clear his head. The last eight months, since Rose Tyler first showed up on the TARDIS after he'd gotten the mysterious blue envelope, he'd been barely holding it together. It was surprising that he hadn't let it show to his two traveling companions. Why had the Bad Wolf decided to only manifest itself now? There were so many questions running around in his mind.

The first time, Bad Wolf was a message for Rose Tyler, leading her back to help him on Satellite 5. The second time it was to let him know that Rose was returning. But now? Why was the words returning now?

"Okay, Sexy. Take me where I need to go."

It took all of a minute for the TARDIS to dematerialize from her spot on Demon's Run and rematerialize at her destination. He grinned and ran to the door. "Where are we?" he asked aloud. Opening the door, he stepped out into the bright sunshine of Cardiff. He pulled the TARDIS door closed behind him as he tried to work out exactly where he was in Cardiff. There was a sinking pit in his stomach when he realised that he was near the Millennium Centre, near the heart of Cardiff. The TARDIS had parked herself right over the rift.

Turning back to his ship, he stroked her doors. "Why did you bring me here? Hmm?"

The TARDIS refused to budge, and wouldn't let him enter her doors. The Doctor frowned and moved away from his ship. What was he going to do now? Perhaps he could pay a visit to Jack Harkness. That thought sent a shiver up his spine. Whenever he thought of that man, he couldn't help but think of how _wrong_ the man felt to him.

He made his way to where the hub would have been. Jack Harkness was one person he knew would be in a similar position as himself. But the charred hollow of what once was Torchwood 3 echoed deep within the Doctor's soul. He sank to his knees. What happened?

"They were trying to save the children." The Doctor froze at the voice coming from behind him. He didn't want to turn around, just in case his ears were playing tricks on him. But the voice he knew belonging to one Rose Tyler continued. "And the world didn't like Jack's involvement. So they blew him up and killed Ianto Jones in the process. Jack and Gwen managed to save the children, at the cost of Jack's grandson."

The Doctor shifted around and looked up at his pink and yellow girl – no, woman – and croaked out, "Rose?"

She smiled sadly down at his kneeling figure. "Hello, Doctor."

"Rose?" he asked again. He lifted his hand and reached out hesitantly toward her before he pulled back again.

"Bit of a broken record there, mate." She reached out and snagged his outreached hand. "I'm really here, Doctor."

"How? I mean, how did you get here? What happened to Captain Jack? How long ago was this thing with the children? And how did you know this was me?" He stood up and inched himself closer to her, holding onto her as if she was his lifeline

Rose smiled and shook her head. "Nice to know some things don't change. You've still got a gob that doesn't admit to anything important." She took a deep breath. "Okay, Doctor, first two questions is rather a long story. One day, you'll know it. Jack fled once Torchwood was destroyed, only two days ago." She turned to survey the destruction of Ronald Dahl Pass. Indicating with her head, she added, "This happened last week. The council is working on getting this fixed up as soon as possible."

"Last week?" the Doctor echoed, also looking over the destruction.

"Yes, you were busy at the time, being all 'self-important'. Trying to change things that should be left well enough alone. And you avoid Cardiff, and you well know that."

The Doctor looked panicked down at Rose. Again, the question of how she knew about what he'd done right toward the end of his last regeneration came to the forefront of his mind. "How?"

"Broken record." Rose looked up at the Doctor, trying to memorise his features. "Doctor, I don't have much time. I'm only here to give you a message."

"How long do you have?" he asked, also drinking in her face and features. He was hoping she could stay with him forever.

"About two minutes. The message is: 'Don't give up, and don't be hard on River.'"

"You know about River?"

"Yes. Again, that's part of the long story. She needs you. And she loves you so much."

The Doctor's hearts were pounding in his ears. How did Rose know River? Why was she telling him about a woman she'd never met? He released her hand and let it drop to his side. It felt empty without her hand in it, but couldn't work out why he couldn't bring himself to care.

"Doctor, I know, because I create myself. Bad Wolf, heart of the TARDIS. You need her, just as much as she needs you."

"Heart of the TARDIS? Bad Wolf? What do you mean?"

"You'll understand. One day." Rose looked over her shoulder and the Doctor followed her gaze. In the distance, he spotted an older gentleman with a younger woman. The older man's attention was on the two of them talking. Rose returned her attention to him. She reached up and cupped his cheek so she could bring his attention back to her. "I need to go. But things will work out for you. Trust me, Doctor. Even if you can't see it right now, it will work out. And don't be afraid to love River Song, with both of your hearts. You'd be surprised what comes of that."

The Doctor looked over Rose's shoulder once more and asked, "Who's that?"

"Surely you would know there is only one man I would travel with, Doctor. Only one man I can claim as my husband." She smiled sadly, knowing that this Doctor couldn't claim to be that man. "I'm sorry, Doctor. I moved on. So must you. If you are to have any future at all, you must find Melody Pond and look after her. She's going to be amazing. Help her see that."

The Doctor was immobilized again; he hardly heard the last part of what Rose, _his _Rose had said. Rose, his precious Rose had moved on. Of course she had. That's what he had wanted, wasn't it? Now, though, after seeing her standing in front of him again, he wasn't so sure. She gripped his hand again and then let go. She started moving away.

"Don't go," he pleaded.

She backed away from him, and she held up a hand when he tried to follow. "I have to. You know I do. Goodbye, doctor. You'll see me again. You watch us run." She turned and walked away, toward the grey haired man in black, knowing full well his gaze followed her.

The last statement took him a while to register. In fact, the whole conversation seemed surreal. Had Rose Tyler really been standing in front of him? He looked down at his closed hand and felt the slip of paper she had given him. He opened his hand and unfolding the paper, he read it. In her flowing handwriting was just one sentence. _"I will always treasure the time we had together, my Doctor, but never forget to live in the present."_

He allowed a shadow of a smile cross his face as he lifted his eyes up to where Rose had disappeared with who he thought was his meta-crisis self. He knew he could no longer claim her as his, but he'd been thankful for the two minutes she'd taken out to talk to him – to give him hope that things would work out.

"You watch us run," he whispered, repeating the last words she said to him. His eyes widened. He'd heard those exact words before. But not from Rose. They were words _River _had told him – in the library when he had first met her, and then again when he'd dropped her off in Storm Cage after the Spaceman 1969 thing happened. A manic grin began to spread its way across his face. Rose had given him hope. Oh, he was looking forward to seeing River again. And he knew exactly where to start – 1969.

**HDSGH**

It took him six months to chase down every "Bad Wolf" lead – sometimes they took him to places that either River had just been to; other times they took him to places little Melody Pond had been; and yet other times, he was bumping into River – before they dried up. He didn't mind though. Something about the conversation with Rose in Cardiff had given him something to believe in again.

And he did take Rose's words to heart. He moved on, or tried to anyway. In the process, he felt himself falling for the complicated woman that was his best friends' daughter.

And after he'd exhausted all the "Bad Wolf" leads that he could, he thought about his two friends stuck on the slow path in Leadworth. He should really get back to them and let them know what was happening. He felt a prod coming from his TARDIS.

"What is it, Old Girl?" He moved to the scanner, where she displayed a newspaper headline. He rolled his eyes as he saw the picture. It could have only been Rory and Amy who'd spell out his name in the form of a crop circle. "Whose idea was that then?" Shrugging his shoulders, he said, "Well, we'd better go answer the call."

**HDSGH**

For some reason, they ended up in Berlin, right on the eve of World War II. Just because of this supposed best friend of Rory and Amy's that the Doctor hadn't heard of. He was, obviously, confused as to who exactly Mels was until he saw the words "bad wolf" on some papers scattered across Hitler's desk. He grinned to himself as he settled the gun he'd taken off Mels in the fruit bowl.

And then he closed his eyes. Of course, Melody Pond was part Time Lord – she was conceived in his TARDIS. The man behind the desk stood up and the Doctor started rambling, apologising to what turned out to be Hitler.

Things got hectic for a moment – the 'wounded' man on the floor stood up; Hitler drew a gun and started firing; Rory put Hitler into a cupboard; and Mels got shot.

The Doctor stood back, even though Rory and Amy rushed to Mel's side. Oh, how he wanted to join them beside their injured friend, but he could guess what was coming next. "Mels, were you ever going to tell them?"

Mels winced and frowned. "Tell them what?"

"Who you are. Amy, Rory. Step back." Mels' hands started to take on a golden glow. The Doctor moved to be between Amy and Rory to pull them up and away from their friend. "Stay back."

"What's happening?" Rory asked.

"This is something Time Lords can do," the Doctor said in way of explanation. He focused on Mel's glowing form. "Mels is short for Melody, right?"

Mels nodded just as Amy said, "Yeah, I name my daughter after her."

"You named your daughter after your daughter," the Doctor put in.

"Can someone please explain what is going on?" Rory put in again.

"Shut up, Dad, I'm focusing on a dress size!" Mels had the final word before she released the pent up retentive energy. It took her all of a minute to change from being a woman with dark skin and braids to the woman who they knew as River Song.

Amy and Rory looked shocked to see the change in their friend and, it turned out, their daughter. Melody looked down her new form – it was all untested. First things first, she wanted to get a good look at herself in the mirror. The Doctor ran a hand over his face and leaned back against the desk.

"That's River."

"Is anyone else finding this day just a little hard?"

"How did you know, Doctor?"

The Doctor signed and reached back behind him for the paper he saw when they first came into the room. "This."

Amy took the page off him. "Bad Wolf. What's that?"

"Two words across time and space that to anyone else, don't mean anything. To me, they give me hope. And I only see them when I really need them." The Doctor smiled and looked in the direction where River Song had disappeared. He knew for this instance, they were telling him about this psychopath that had been raised to kill him.

"How can that be our daughter, and River Song?"

Melody Pond stuck her head out of the door she'd disappeared through. "Who's River Song?"

The Doctor continued to look at her. "Spoilers." He knew the older River would have picked up that hated saying from him.

"Spoilers?" River asked. "What's spoilers?"

The Doctor shrugged, knowing he couldn't really answer the question without giving anything away. And he snorted slightly. Hadn't she feed him the same line many times before? River held up a finger and disappeared back into the room she'd gone into before.

Rose's words from Cardiff echoed through his mind again. _"You need her, just as much as she needs you."_ It wasn't until the Doctor saw River in these beginning stages that he worked out just what she meant. His life would be nothing without River, and he knew River would be nothing without him. He took in a deep breath. He couldn't believe how complicated his life was. Why couldn't it be straight forward, like it used to be?

He heard laughing in his mind. Something that River had told him while he was busy searching for her younger self came back to him. _"When is life ever easy for you love? You eat impossible for breakfast."_

River came back into the main room with a gun in her hand. The Doctor patiently explained to a confused Amy and Rory what was happening. Reminding them of Demon's Run when they'd first lost their daughter. "She's doing what she was trained to do. My own personal psychopath." The Doctor got into River's face and gave her a teasing smile before he let her give him a peck on his lips.

River moved back from the Doctor and moved to the window. "Berlin on the eve of war. My sort of town. Mum, Dad, don't follow me. And yes, that was a warning."

The Doctor gave the woman he was falling hopelessly in love with a half-smile. "No warning for me then?"

"Sweetie, you don't need one."

**HDSGH**

He knew he was dying. Properly dying. If only he hadn't let his guard down with River. Melody Pond. If only he hadn't allowed her to steal that one kiss that was going to kill him. If only… How many lives have been wasted with 'if only's'?

"Oh, my Doctor. You're not dying," a soft melodious voice whispered. "I would not be here if you were." He blinked and tried to focus. A shadowy figure of Rose Tyler, as the Bad Wolf, leaned over him. "Hold on."

He tried to bring the figure fully into focus and found it wasn't Rose leaning over him but River Song. She was glowing golden, just as she had earlier that day – just as Rose had many years before – and he found himself healing. River was healing him with her regenerations.

"River?"

"Hello Sweetie," she whispered.

"What are you doing?" he croaked out.

"Saving your life," she answered, before she allowed her lips to descend on his.

**HDSGH**

Rose was there. In the garden. The Doctor smiled down at her. He was still confused about how she had managed to get back to the Prime Universe. But he knew that was one mystery he wouldn't be able to solve until she was good and ready to tell her. Giving her a brief nod, the Doctor turned his attention on what was happening in the room around him. One day he'd find out. Right now though, River needed him. And he knew he needed her just as much. River was awake again, if only barely.

"The Doctor said no one could save him, but he must have known I could."

"Rule one. The Doctor lies." He got up and moved to River's bed, just as she drifted off again. Placing a blue, leather bound, diary on the table beside his sleeping love's face, he smiled. "She's going to be amazing." He raised his eyes briefly to catch Rory and Amy's gaze.

Realising what the Doctor wanted to do before they left, Rory left his daughter's bedside and pulled Amy with him. The Doctor sat beside his wife – oh, he knew he hadn't married her yet, but one day, he was going to make good on that promise – and traced her jaw. He was accepting of the fact this woman sleeping before him would come to mean so much to him. His fingers moved to play with her curls, if only briefly. He leaned down and planted a kiss on her forehead. Pulling back, he took one last look at the sleeping woman before he stood.

"Come along Ponds."


	3. Part Two

**Part Two**

The Doctor was a coward. He always hated endings, and didn't want to see either Amy or Rory hurt - or him ending up standing over their graves. So, after the prison ship fiasco, he pushed them away. He broke Amy's trust in him, and then dumped them back on Earth. He'd be fine punching around the galaxy on his own. Anyway, it would give him a chance to really find some answers about River, and the whole 'Bad Wolf' thing.

And, if he was truly honest with himself, he was scared. He knew the day was coming when he would be back to visit the Ponds for the last time (he couldn't quite bring himself to say that this was the end for them). He also knew he had to be at Lake Silencio in Utah. But he couldn't bring himself to head there now.

He looked around the console room and his eyes fell on the jump seat where Amy would take refuge if they were having a bumpy ride. On it was a blue, leather bound journal - so similar to the one he'd given River just a few weeks previously – and he gave a sad smile. He moved to the seat and picked it up. Flicking his thumb along the edge, he knew that this diary would be empty.

The Doctor looked up at the time rotor and gave the TARDIS a small smile. "What do you say, Sexy?" He reached up with his free hand and stroked the column. "Shall we start filling up the pages in this book?"

He laughed out loud when, in response, the TARDIS took off, heading to places unknown.

**HDSGH**

His first stop was Barcelona – the planet, not the city. River, somehow, showed up while he was there. When he first saw her, he could tell she was a younger version of the River he knew in the past. The Doctor smiled, and walked over to her. "Fancy meeting you here, Ms Song," he said in way of greeting.

"It's Doctor Song, actually," River corrected him, returning his smile.

"Where are we, then?" he asked, trying to gage how young she really was.

She dropped her gaze, just as she pulled out her diary. "I've just been imprisoned." He took a close look at her diary, and knew it was very early days for her – her diary still looked new.

"Ah. No need for me to ask what for." He looked her over before giving her his best comforting smile. He knew what she was in Storm Cage for. "Very early days for you then. Have we gone over the rules yet?"

"What rules?"

He smiled, and offered her his arm. "If you would allow me to escort you around Barcelona, milady, I will explain them to you."

River returned her diary to her pocket and hooked her arm around his proffered one. "I would be delighted, Doctor."

His smile grew. He began to lead the two of them through the busy streets, pointing out little things to her. It wasn't long before he grew serious again. "Never let me see the inside of your diary. It's to keep track of our adventures together so you don't let anything slip. We never meet in the right order, and any foreknowledge of future events is never a good thing." Oh, he knew full well it wasn't a good thing – he knew that one day he'd have to say goodbye to the young woman on his arm, and she'd go to the library to meet his younger self. He looked down at her as she nodded.

River would agree to anything this man said – she'd heard stories about him all her life and she knew he knew all about her. And she knew he knew more about her than he was willing to share. That was okay with her. It was more fun for her to live her life with him than to be told her life with him. And that trip to Barcelona helped cement her feelings of love and attraction to this man from the stars.

They took days to explore the planet, and to get to know each other better. River was more open with the Doctor, (yet she didn't share the same past as him), and he felt himself relax around her more. Once they explored all they could of the planet without River's jailers working out she'd gone, the Doctor took her back to Storm Cage.

Leaning against the cage doors, he lifted his hand up to cup her cheek. He moved his fingers up to run them through her curls. "Promise me, River Song, that you'll never spend more than half your sentence outside these walls. We'll see each other often. I promise you that."

River lit up at the promise issuing out of the Doctor's mouth. "I promise," she returned. It didn't take much. Half her sentence in Storm Cage? She could only imagine what the other half would be for. He saw the glint in her eyes.

Leaning down, he kissed her gently before he pulled away. "I'll see you soon." He turned his back on her and walked back to the TARDIS, wondering where his clever girl would take him next.

**HDSGH**

The Doctor saw River many times over the years he tried running from his imminent death. Each time, he felt like it was always a chance for them to have a better 'first date' since the first one they had in 1938. He never really knew when, or where, they would meet, but he always looked forward to seeing her, and to their verbal sparring.

Like always, there were times when things were dangerous – River Song seemed to live for those times. The Doctor didn't blame her for wanting excitement once in a while. But the times that the Doctor lived for were the times when there were no demands on them, there were no pressures. The times when they could focus on just themselves. Because the Doctor knew that the time would come when he would have to say goodbye. And he didn't want to remember the times that involved running, flirting and getting shot at. He'd rather have the memories of dinners, and skating, and moonlit walks.

And those times were getting fewer, the Doctor knew. So when the words 'Bad Wolf' reappeared after almost 200 years of being absent from his life, he knew he needed to face the facts. His time with River was running out. And he had yet to take her to Drinium. He'd promised her years ago that he'd take her one day. Oh, but he knew the trip would be one of the hardest he had ever done. He sighed. It was probably time for him to stop running from his own death too.

"Okay, Old Girl. Let's do this, shall we?"

He tried to remember what River had told him when he first met her. _"The real you, the you from the future, showed up at my door with a new suit and a haircut. He took me to Darillium, and the Singing Towers. Oh what a night that was. And he cried. I could never understand how he could be so sad, but I guess he knew it was time. Time for me to come to the Library."_

Okay, he'd follow what she said – what she remembered and let slip. First step was to get a haircut. Then find a new suit. After that, he found the correct point in River's time stream – that was probably one of the hardest parts of the preparation.

But he found her, and knew she'd been released from Storm Cage. He smiled as she opened her door. "Hi," he said softly.

"Sweetie, come in," she moved so he could move passed her into her home.

"Why don't you grab your coat and come with me?" he countered.

River frowned. "Are we going somewhere?"

"Yes. We're going somewhere I should have taken you years ago."

"Okay, any hints?"

He smiled, and shook his head. "It's a surprise, honey."

Their first trip was to a planet that reminded the Doctor of Gallifrey. Taking her hands, he said he had made a promise to her, just before she was incarcerated for his murder, that they'd have a proper wedding. And this was him living up to his promise. River felt tears running down her cheeks as he whispered his name in her ear and they cemented their relationship until time was taken from them.

River expected that that was all that the Doctor had planned for their night out, giving her his commitment and hearts (although she knew she'd had his hearts for centuries). But he surprised her again, when the next time she opened the doors to the TARDIS, they were on Darillium. Her jaw dropped and she looked over toward him. He had a sad, half smile on his face. Walking over to her, he offered her his arm.

"Shall we really go and enjoy our wedding night, River?"

"Yes, we shall, my love." She hooked her arm through his and led the way out into the plains below the Singing Towers. River never asked where they were in their respective timelines, knowing that this Doctor with her was one that knew most of her secrets, if not all of them. And she could tell something was affecting him. "Is something the matter, Sweetie?"

The Doctor shook himself out of his musings. "Hmm? Nothing's the matter. Let's just enjoy our time together." When he could tell she didn't believe him, he pleaded for her to drop it.

That night was magnificent. And even though the Doctor wanted it to last, he knew it couldn't. Toward the end of the night, he asked her if he had told her about the Bad Wolf.

"I only know bits and pieces," River admitted. "When I tried to research her, there wasn't any information to be found."

He laughed, in spite of his tears. "Probably a good thing, then. They're words of hope – or in some cases, telling me to stop running." He then proceeded to tell her of all the times he'd seen the words over the course of their relationship. How the words, and the person associated with them, had encouraged him to find her, love her and not be afraid.

River loved him all the more for sharing that part of him with her. She had always wondered what, or who, Bad Wolf was to him. Looking at him now, as he dropped her off at her apartment, she knew something terrible must be approaching. In all the years she had known him, she could only recall one time he'd cried, and had been willing to show her how upset he was. But she dared not ask him what it was he was afraid of. They lingered in her doorway for a while, before he kissed her.

Pulling away, the Doctor smiled. "Until next time, Professor River Song." He turned from her and walked away from her into his TARDIS – he'd opened the doors with a snap of his fingers.

**HDSGH**

The Doctor knew after he said goodbye to the River Song who was heading to the Library to meet his younger self, he knew his next stop was to meet a younger River, Amy and Rory to send them on their journey to 1969. But he couldn't work out how Rose had sent messages to them and his younger self.

She was the one that sent him on his journey with River in the first place. He leaned back in the jump seat, trying to work out if the journey had been worth it. Everybody left him in the end.

"My body's tired of travelling and my hearts don't wish to roam…" he whispered. Looking up at the rotor, the Doctor wished he could speak to the TARDIS again. Or, she could talk to him again and give him advice as to what to do next. He stood and began to flip switches to get the TARDIS moving through the vortex.

The question still plagued him; though Rose had said years ago that she would see him in 1969, he didn't know if she actually had. And at the back of his mind, he still questioned himself about how she managed to cross parallel worlds to get back to him. Or if she had gotten back a second time. If she had gotten back a second time, what had happened to his meta-crisis? There were so many questions he wanted to sit down and ask her.

"Morbid much?"

The Doctor looked up at the sound of someone else in his TARDIS. Looking around the central column of his TARDIS, he saw Rose standing by the doors. His mouth opened and closed like a fish. She smiled at him and bound up the stairs to join him at the console. "You didn't even hear me come in, did you?"

"I didn't even feel her land. What are you doing here?"

"I'm here to help you, Doctor."

"How did you get in here?"

"I still have a key. Do you have those envelopes?" He frowned and pulled them out of his coat. She grinned and took them off him. "Great! I'll get these out to those that need them." Holding them up and poking his chest with them, she added, "You need to go find the Teselecta."

"What?" the Doctor asked.

"Time states you have to be at Lake Silencio, Utah, on April 22nd, 2011. But it doesn't state that you can't dress for the part." She stuck her tongue out the corner of her mouth as she watched him register what she said. He frowned slightly, and then he looked up at her with a shocked expression on his face. She giggled and leaned over to kiss him on the cheek. "Good luck, Doctor." And then she was off, back out the door, leaving him to work out the final details of his 'death'.

He suddenly stopped and looked toward the doors Rose had disappeare through. How did she get here? He felt the TARDIS mentally prod him, as if to say "Get back to work."

"What?" the Doctor asked aloud. "Can't anyone ask questions around here?"


	4. Interlude

**Interlude**

The Doctor was floating around the vortex, high above Victorian London. As he had been for the past fifty years. What was the point of anything anymore? He was done with the whole, 'saving the planet' thing now that Amy and Rory were gone. And somehow, he also knew his visits with River Song had come to the end as well. He knew he'd never see his best friends, or his wife, ever again. Oh, he knew River still had a few adventures with him yet. But it wasn't with _him._ He'd already had them.

He kicked the sofa in the library within the TARDIS before he turned and collapsed on it. In the end, perhaps it was best that they were gone. Amy and Rory were getting a little restless of the life he led – especially when they were getting older. He couldn't blame them for wanting to settle down.

But how it hurt when they left. And the way they'd left. By a touch of an angel. He was a little jealous of River, with her being able to pop back in time to visit her parents, even if it was only once or twice. At least she had that option. _He _couldn't ever go back and see them. The time lines around New York would never allow him to land the TARDIS there ever again. What was the point of saving the universe when the universe was so cruel to him? It didn't matter how often he risked his life, it still took something from him.

First, it was his granddaughter. He didn't want to think about what had happened to his dear, sweet Susan. Oh, she was just the first in a long, countless line of people he'd loved and lost. Barbara, Ian, Vicki, Steven, Polly, Jamie, Victoria, Liz Shaw, Jo Grant, Sarah Jane, Tegan, Adric, Romana, Nyssa, Turlough, Peri, Melanie, Ace, Charley, Lucie, Grace, Rose, Martha, Donna, Jack, Amy, Rory, River… the list could go on. He'd lost so many people in his long, long life, and he didn't see the point of going on any longer.

"Message recorded. Play message?"

The Doctor sat up and grabbed the closest thing he could throw. He hurled the book toward the door and the voice he did _not _want to hear. What had the Bad Wolf done for him in the past except break his hearts?

He first allowed himself to fall in love Rose Tyler, who was completely human and had a human lifespan to go with that. She'd been forcefully taken from him; first to a parallel world and then to a man that was him, but not him. Then, he'd been encouraged to love a woman he knew would end up sacrificing herself for 4022 people. If he hadn't listened to Rose – if he hadn't let himself hope that things would work out – he wouldn't have the deep pain in his hearts now.

Oh, who was he kidding? Even if Rose hadn't shown up right at the beginning to get him to let her go, he still would have fallen for River. Maybe not as deeply, but he still would have loved her. He buried his face in his hands.

"Doctor, it's time for you to move on. They will live on in your memories, and in your hearts. Please remember, no matter how hard it gets, you are loved. And each of us that have known you, or will know you, is far better off from having met you. Even if the cost to us is high. We wouldn't exchange the 'good' life you want for us for the _great_ life we have when we know you. I am a far better person after having known you, even if that was at the high cost I had to pay." The recording paused, and the Doctor lifted his tired head up to find the hologram. Rose's image had looked down as she shifted from foot to foot.

Another voice from off camera came over the sound system and the Doctor watched as Rose looked up toward where the voice was coming from. "We could come back and give this another go, love, if you want."

The Doctor stood and moved to where Rose was standing. It was only then that he realised that she was silently crying. She lifted her hand up and brushed her tears away. "No. We both know this is the only chance we'll have to record these messages. And the Doctor needs to know this. You know he needs the hope that things don't always turn to dust. Things don't always end the way he thinks they do. He needs to remember the good times, and the bad. Life moves on, and it would be a dark day when the Doctor gives up on life. I would not have found you again if he just sat back and did nothing."

"Are you sure it's wise to record all that, love?" There was that voice again. And for some reason, it seemed very familiar to the Doctor. As if he'd heard the voice before.

Rose held up her holographic hand and said, "No, you can't be seen in the hologram. We agreed that it would be me to pass the messages on. Now shut up as I finish this. We don't have long."

The Doctor snorted slightly as he watched an irritated Rose Tyler tell someone off. He was glad it wasn't him. But then, just as Rose turned her attention to him again, the glaring question occurred to him: who was she with? In his TARDIS?

"Doctor, I'll be waiting for you. Come and find me."

"How? How am I supposed to do that?" the Doctor cried, momentarily forgetting it was a recorded message that was playing and that Rose couldn't hear him.

She wiped her eyes again, and the Doctor couldn't believe how beautiful she looked, even with the tear stains that streaked her cheeks. "Bad Wolf found a way back for me, and now, you need to find me. Find me, and be fantastic while you're at it."

The messaged finished, and Rose's image stilled before shutting off. The Doctor blinked at where she had been standing, and then looked at the door to the library. Was he willing to move on and start living again, or was he going to stay locked in the TARDIS for the rest of his days? He moved back to the sofa he'd been lying on and sat down.

So Rose had just answered one of his many questions about her for him. She _had_ found a way back to the Prime Universe. It also answered the question of how (sort of): Bad Wolf. That could also explain why he'd seen her in 1969 (but not why she said she'd see _him_ in 1969), again at Cardiff, and right before he went to Lake Silencio.

He smiled – truly smiled for the first time since he'd lost Amy, Rory and River. Maybe the future wasn't too bleak. And it was time for him to repay his friends in Victorian London, who'd watched over him while he picked up the pieces of his broken life.

Through helping them; Strax, Jenny and Madam Vastra; he'd found another puzzle to solve: Who was Clara Oswin Oswald?


	5. Part Three

**Part Three**

"Stay with me, Clara. My impossible girl," the Doctor whispered. He had his arms around her and when he felt her go limp, it wasn't hard for him to lift her into his arms. And although Clara couldn't hear him anymore, the Doctor continued. "He is my secret."

"What I did, I did in the name of peace, and sanity," his past regeneration said – his war self said.

"But not in the name of the Doctor," the 11th accused. Taking one last look at the man he had once been – the man that couldn't claim to be the 'Doctor' – he turned and walked out of his time stream. Shifting Clara's weight so he could carry her more comfortably, he began to make his journey back to the TARDIS.

He smiled when he approached his ship. Madam Vastra, Jenny and Strax were waiting for him to arrive. Jenny looked concerned at the limp Clara in his arms. "She's fine. Just a little worse for wear," the Doctor said at the concerned looks he was receiving. Clicking his fingers; tricky when he was trying not to drop his friend; the Doctor's smile grew as the doors opened and Clara began to stir. He led the way into his ship. She blinked and looked up at him. "You awake now?" She nodded. Moving to one of the jump seats, he gently sat her in it. "You were very brave, my impossible girl. Thank you."

Before Strax, Madam Vastra or Jenny could say anything, or comment about the interior of the TARDIS, all attention was drawn to the doors that were slammed open. The figure in the doorway looked around the room confused. Mud and dried blood covered her face and her clothing was torn. She looked around the room in confusion. "Doc- doctor?" she croaked.

The Doctor immediately jumped up and held up his hands. "Easy!" he called.

Her eyes fell on him. "D-d-d…" She drew in a shallow breath and couldn't get his name out again. Releasing the short breath she'd taken, she took in another shallow breath.

The Doctor's eyes widened and realised that the girl, whoever it was, was going into shock. Leaving Clara's side, he moved to this mysterious girl's side and held out his hands to her in what he hoped was an unthreatening way. "I'm the Doctor, I'm here. Focus on me. Can you do that?" She nodded and he looked deep into her eyes. Hazel eyes. No, he couldn't think about that. He had to get her calm. "Take a deep breath and hold it." She did as he asked. "Good. Breathe out slowly." He watched as she followed his commands. "Breathe in… and breathe out… very good." He had her do that twice more before she had calmed herself down. And it was only then that he took a good look at her eyes. "Rose?"

She nodded. "That's me. Where are we? I was on Trenzalore with the Doctor. My Doctor. Umm, umm… John Noble." Rose began to look around the console room for her Doctor. The Doctor looked at her with confusion before he realised that she wasn't talking about _him_, but his meta-crisis. "Did he come in after me?" When she couldn't see him there with her, she turned around and went to the doors. Pulling them open again, she looked out over the graves of Trenzalore. It was so different from the planet she'd just fled from. This planet looked dead, whereas the planet she had just come from was still breathing. If albeit it's last breath in the last days of a universe wide war. It was the two of them – her John Noble and herself – against the rest of the parallel universe that didn't want two anomalies to exist. She looked confused. "Which universe is this?"

"Parallel universes exist?" Clara asked, standing shakily at the console.

Rose turned to look at the girl and shot back, "Yeah, they do. They're created by choices and decisions people could make at any given time." She looked back at the Doctor and asked, "I'm back, aren't I?"

"Yeah."

"And John?" she couldn't stop her bottom lip from quivering as she asked that.

"I'm sorry, he didn't come through."

Rose looked around the console room, trying to keep her tears in. It was then she saw the three other people the Doctor had with them. She made her way as gracefully as she could around the room and into the heart of the TARDIS. The Doctor's gaze followed her.

This was going to take a lot of explaining, and a lot of work.

**HDSGH**

It took the Doctor days to find Rose Tyler. He'd dropped Madam Vastra, Jenny, Strax and Clara back in their own times so he could focus on sorting out what exactly had happened to Rose. And try work out his burning questions as to how she'd stumbled from her parallel world to his by just walking into his TARDIS.

And why, when he met a future version of Rose (because that's the only thing that made sense), she had pushed him toward River Song? Unless he told her to go back. But that didn't make sense. When he saw the future version of Rose in Cardiff, she was with an older man in black and a young woman. And the last message she'd recorded for him in the TARDIS databanks, he heard a Scottish voice he knew didn't belong to him – or to his doppelganger. His meta-crisis couldn't have been the person he heard or saw because the man didn't return with Rose.

He ran his hand along the corridors of his ship. "Where is she, Old Girl?" A door appeared by his outstretched fingers. Smiling softly, he opened the door and looked around the room in wonder. It was a planet with lush green grasslands and a burnt orange sky. It reminded him of Gallifrey, if only in part. "How?" He didn't realised he had spoken until she looked up at him and patted the grass beside her.

"The Doctor – my Doctor – took me here when our TARDIS was first able to travel. He told me it reminded him of your home planet." The Doctor removed his outer jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders before sitting down beside her. She pulled the jacket closer around her arms. "Thanks," she whispered. "He knew this day was coming."

"What do you mean?"

Rose looked at the man sitting next to her, with a face that was so familiar, but one she hadn't seen for years. "Neither of you ever thought to check me out after the whole 'Bad Wolf' incident on Satellite 5. You didn't even notice when things weren't going so well with me. 'Nah', you thought, 'she'll be fine'." She sniffed. "Mum noticed though. She mentioned it to me just before the Battle of Canary Wharf. But she knew I wasn't really hers in the first place."

The Doctor frowned down at Rose. "But you're human. You can't possibly be anything else."

She snorted. "Am I? Did you even check?" She shook her head and looked back over the scene before her. "Trust me, John wanted to when he noticed I wasn't aging like he was. Granted, he aged slower for a human, but he still aged."

"Did you let him?"

"I didn't need him to. I already knew who I was. It was only then that I let him know my whole story. I'd told Pete and Mum not long after we got trapped the first time."

"Who are you, Rose Tyler?"

Rose smiled and looked up at the Doctor. "I was created in this very TARDIS. My very beginning began while she was in flight. You called me a child of the TARDIS."

The Doctor backed away from her slightly. "But I only said that about… River?"

"Hello Sweetie." She ducked her head and the odd sounding phrase coming out of her mouth. "And I'm never saying that again."

"But how? You used up all you regenerations to bring me back to life."

"What's the first rule with travelling with you?"

"Don't wander off?"

"That too, but the Doctor lies. When I bought you back, I was still in my first 15 hours of my regeneration cycle."

"But… but…"

She giggled. "Broken record, mate." Turning to face him fully, she gently cupped his cheek. "Can you give me a few days?"

He closed his eyes at her caress. Lifting his hand to cover hers, he placed a kiss on her wrist. "It has been a few days."

Rose frowned. "Really?"

"Yeah, you've been back nearly a week."

"And you didn't come find me before now?"

"I tired."

"Oh." She blinked a few times as she thought about that. "The TARDIS must really like me then. Or else she knew I wasn't ready to face you yet." Looking at him, she gave him her most endearing smile before she stood up. "While we play 20 questions," she said as she pulled him to his feet, "let's go find Jack Harkness."

**HDSGH**

It took them a few tries to find Jack Harkness. Eventually, they found him in an intergalactic bar near Stol. Rose grinned as he sat himself on a stool at the bar after trying to chat up some locals. Pulling the Doctor along with her, she sat herself down on the empty stool beside him. As Jack was facing the opposite way, he didn't see his new company until Rose started talking.

"Oi, mate. You gonna buy us a drink?"

Jack's head snapped around as he registered the voice. "Rosie?"

She grinned, that same grin with a little bit of her tongue sticking out the edge of her mouth. "Who else?"

He laughed and threw his arms around her. "Gorgeous." Pulling back, Jack asked, "Who's your friend? Isn't he a little young for a bar? And where's your plus one?"

Rose giggled and rolled her eyes. "I'm going to slap you, Jack. And I can say with certainty that the three of us are the oldest people in this bar." Pointing to the Doctor, she said, "New regeneration."

"Doctor?"

"Harkness," the Doctor said in way of greeting.

"As for my plus one," Rose said, suddenly getting serious. "My _other _plus one. John died. Last week."

"Hang on, oldest three people?" Jack asked. "I know the Doc and I have been kicking back a couple of centuries, but you don't look older than 35."

The Doctor frowned at Jack's question and then asked, "How long ago did I leave you and the meta-crisis on Bad Wolf Bay?"

"Please don't call him that. His name was John Noble. And we had 100 years together." Rose sighed, and added, "Toward the end, in that parallel universe, we heard this saying: 'Silence must fall when the question is asked, on the Fields of Trenzalore, at the fall of the Eleventh, when no living creature can speak falsely or fail to answer…'" The Doctor froze, recalling the words Dorium had told him just after he'd faked his death at Lake Silencio. "Doctor, John and I know you are in your last regeneration. It means that the saying could be referring to John, who was your eleventh."

"But I'm the eleventh Doctor."

"I don't want to think about it, Doctor. Because I cannot live through losing you. Again. Can we please leave this and get back to something more cheerful?"

"You're looking good for your age, Rosie," Jack said. "So 100 years in the parallel world makes you what? 127?"

"Closer to 350, Captain," the Doctor shot back. "I've loved her for most of them."

Rose's eyes shot up. "Excuse me! I am right here and can answer for myself. You are seriously underestimating how long I've been around. Try 557 years." Suddenly, she burst into laughter. "I can't believe we're arguing about my age. Remember how you got me to promise to stay in Storm Cage for at least half my sentence? Well, consider this: I was chasing you around the galaxy for 150 years while I was stuck in there."

"You were in Storm Cage?" Jack asked. "What did you do to get thrown in there? And when? When I first met you, you were this 19-year-old shop girl from London."

Rose and the Doctor shared a look before the Doctor leaned around Rose. "Jack Harkness, meet River Song. Though you haven't proven that to me yet."

"I haven't yet? Simple solution." Rose leaned over and whispered something Jack couldn't work out.

The Doctor's eyes widened and then hardened. "He could've told you that."

"Okay. Last time you saw me, in my last body, I think was the day we went to New York. We were dealing with the Weeping Angels. You were reading a book about our adventures and I had to break my wrist, just because Mum read it. You were mad because you knew we would have to say goodbye to my parents. I got her to write you an epilogue."

Jack held up his hand and drew both Rose's and the Doctor's attention back to him. "Please explain to the confused friend."

"I'm a Time Lady," Rose explained. "My birth parents were companions to this Doctor for a while so I was conceived in the Time Vortex. I've travelled on and off with him for centuries before I met up with him in the Library, where he thought he'd lost me forever. But he hadn't, because of the whole, 'chicken or the egg' question and I ended up regenerating into a baby, which I was then adopted by Pete and Jackie Tyler in 1987. I looked into the Time Vortex at 19 to save the Doctor and you at Satellite 5, and ended up saving myself at the same time."

"You mean you're an ontological paradox?" Jack asked.

"Yeah, I'm one of those. I just didn't remember until the Doctor said farewell to me the first time at Bad Wolf Bay."

The Doctor asked, "Why didn't you remember?"

"I locked my previous self's memories away until you triggered them again with the words 'And, I suppose, if it's my last chance to say it…' You'd given me too much foreknowledge on what happened to me as Rose Tyler." Remembering something, Rose turned her attention back to Jack. "Oh, and when you run into my younger self, don't mention any of this. And if I ask, tell me 'spoilers'."

The three of them looked at each other and remembered the many times they had either heard the word or had said the word to any one of the others. The Doctor's lips twitched. Rose bit her lower lip. Jack just grinned. It wasn't long before they burst into laughter. Of course, that would be their default response if they ran into any of their past (or future) selves.

"Here's to Rosie and her Doctor," Jack said, raising his glass.

"I'll drink to that," Rose said, lifting her glass to Jack's. Both looked at the Doctor expectantly, and he raised his glass up half-heartedly.

Perhaps, the Doctor thought, Rose would be better off without him. Maybe, just maybe, she could forget he existed and forge a future ahead with Jack. He drowned his glass and stood up from the bar.

"Where do you think you're going, mate?"

The Doctor stopped in his tracks and turned to face her. "Around."

"Why don't I come with you?"

"No. Why don't you stay and catch up with Harkness. I'll be around." He walked out of the bar and back to his TARDIS. And he left her there, in that bar on that distant planet, like he had done to her so many times before.


	6. Part Four

**Part Four**

The Doctor was running – that was what he was good at. Rose was hurting, and had just lost everything that was important to her, and he had just left her behind. Like he did with all of his companions. He knew that Jack Harkness would look after his precious girl. And the Doctor thought he wasn't what Rose needed to heal.

If he was being absolutely honest with himself, he was running because he was scared. Scared of what Rose, of what River, truly meant to him. He'd been on his own for so long and when he was faced with the possibility of having someone there for him, relying on him, made him turn tail and head for the hills. With River, when he knew her, and thought he knew her future, it wasn't as hard to let himself love her. He knew that eventually, she'd leave him like everyone else. And Rose, his precious Rose, had just been another human that would eventually leave him to be alone.

All that had changed when Rose had told him that she was once Melody Pond, the daughter of two of his best friends. His future didn't have to be so bleak. But it had been centuries since the Time War ended, and he'd been the last. Until the TARDIS had taken matters into her own hands and had created the Bad Wolf for him. And the TARDIS knew that her thief was afraid.

So the TARDIS took matters into her own hands again and took him to Women Wept. She knew he'd see her Bad Wolf there. Back when he'd taken her there in his 9th self. Rose was hanging onto him as if he was her sole reason for living. So he retreated back into his TARDIS and chose a new destination. He wasn't sure where, or when, he'd be going to, but he liked it that way. But the next planet wasn't to his liking either – the TARDIS directed them to another place where they had taken their Rose.

When that happened the third time - okay, more like the twelfth time, no, twenty-fifth time – and he saw her on a planet he'd chosen at random, he couldn't stop his confusion from settling in his mind. "How did she get here?" he kept on asking himself each time Rose showed up. "Why can't I forget her?" And then, the TARDIS started playing a song – a song he knew Rose had listened to once or twice when she'd been travelling full time with him... And he knew that it was his fault that he was in his current predicament. "_I could tell myself I'm gone, but I still can't get away,"_ the Doctor murmured to himself, along with the lyrics of the song. _"I left her there, like a ghost I disappeared. Oh I didn't even know where I was going. Oh, how did she get here?_"

His eyes widened as he allowed the words to sink in. And to remember what Rose had told him about her life. She'd been created in the TARDIS, and had shared her heart with the heart of his TARDIS… His Rose Tyler, Melody Pond, was the Bad Wolf, and she was connected to his TARDIS through space and time, just because she was the TARDIS's heart.

_"I want you safe, My Doctor,_" Rose had claimed when she first shocked him on Satellite 5. _"I made my choice a long time ago, Doctor, and I'm never ever going to leave you."_ She'd told him that, just before she'd been taken so cruelly from him. _"I trust that man to the ends of the universe, and actually, we've been._" River mentioned that to Anita in the Library, and though at the time he hadn't known who she was to him, it had made him feel secure. _"How do I look?"_ he'd asked her at Demon's Run. "_Amazing,_" she'd replied. There were so many other little things she'd said to him, or about him.

What had he done? River Song, his Rose Tyler, had always believed in him. Had always stuck by him. Had defied the odds to travel through space and time with him, and had been willing to go to prison for him. She'd looked into the heart of the TARDIS and had not burned, where he'd died within minutes of holding the entire vortex within himself. She redefined the word impossible, and had managed to find her way across the walls between universes; not once, but twice; when he had tried and failed multiple times. It had taken him a year to work out that he _was_ what Rose needed to heal. He was the only one really who would be able to understand what she'd gone through.

"Take us back," he said. "Take us back to our impossible Bad Wolf."

When he returned to the bar, Rose and Jack had gone.

**HDSGH**

He returned to the TARDIS with a heavy heart. Entering it, he looked around the console room sadly.

"Where you looking for me?" Rose asked; her voice hard. He'd been gone for a week (according to the planet they were on), and yet, both knew it had been far longer. She knew he had run, that very first day when he made his excuses to leave her with Jack Harkness. And he knew he would've kept seeing her in places he'd never taken her until he owned up to what he'd done.

"Uh… yes."

"And you never stopped to think how it would look to me once I found the TARDIS had gone? What were you thinking?" She stopped and then said, "Don't answer that. You obviously _weren't _thinking. You were taking matters into your own hands, like you always do with my life. At least, with my current self. If this is to work between us, you need to trust me. Right now, you don't." She set her jaw and looked him squarely in the eye. "You make me so mad sometimes Doctor. I don't ask you to give up your opinions and your rights to live your life how you see fit so that I can keep you safe. All I ask is that you do the same for me. I chose this life a long time ago. Don't make me regret it."

The Doctor gulped. He could see how mad she was, and wondered what he needed to do to get back into her good graces.

"Doctor, the only way for me to heal is being right here with you. I'm connected to the TARDIS, and the TARDIS is connected to me. Please don't run from me ever again."

**HDSGH**

It took them nearly thirty years of traveling together for Rose and the Doctor to reconnect. She leaned back and watched the Doctor as he spun around the console. He'd asked her everything he could during that time. Like what had been the meaning behind 'Bad Wolf' each time he'd run into a younger version of her. For that, she told him that it was to give him hope (which he'd worked out when she'd changed from Mels to River) that things would turn out in the end. And what had happened in the parallel world after he'd left her the second time.

He hadn't liked what he'd heard. And it _had _taken her several years to tell him everything that had happened. John – the meta-crisis – had been very good to her, just like he had wanted. Their baby TARDIS had grown and they began to have short journeys through space until the time engines finished growing. Things had been fantastic in the beginning.

But things had started to disintegrate after Rose and John had been in Pete's World for ten years. Jackie, Pete and their son, Tony, had been caught in the explosion at Torchwood 3 while Rose and John were working in the surrounding area. It was similar to what had happened to Jack Harkness and his Torchwood team when the 456 came for the children. People began to notice that neither Rose nor John Noble was aging like the rest of the humankind. And it was more noticeable with Rose Tyler. So they ran.

That's when Rose had confessed to her husband who she really was. She really was River Song, the woman he'd met in the Library, and that she was a Time Lady. From then on, they worked on a way for Rose to get back to the original universe. It was always the plan for the both of them to travel back together.

It took John 70 years to get all the details right, and that's when they heard the message about the fall of the eleventh at Trenzalore. And they discovered the crack in the skin of the universe, asking the oldest question of the universes combined. The question was repeated throughout the whole of space. So, being the investigators they were, Rose Tyler and John Noble, went off on their last adventure together. And they had been trapped on Trenzalore for two decades, fighting side by side until John decided enough was enough.

"How did you get back?" the Doctor finally asked as he moved to his Bad Wolf's side. It was the last question he really needed the answer to, and it was only asked after she'd been back with him for 30 years. Rose looked down at her lap and started pulling on the hem of her shirt. "John and I found a crack in the skin of the world, while we were on Trenzalore. He spent the last few years studying it and he theorised that on the other side of that crack was another universe. He found a way of working out which universe it was and pushed me through. He was shot while getting me to safety."

He was shocked about how much Rose had gone through to get back to him. She'd watched everyone she loved in the parallel world die and then she had to live with the burden of losing someone close to her just so she could survive and find him again. And then he'd pushed her away again.

"I'm sorry," the Doctor whispered.

Rose looked at him and said, "I'll be fine, one day. As long as you promise never to send me away again for my own good. I couldn't live with myself if you did that and I wasn't there to protect you."

He nodded and pulled her into his arms. "I promise," he whispered against her hair. They sat like that for a long while. Her head was resting on his shoulder and his fingers were alternating between playing with her hair and stroking her back and arms in a comforting way.

The Doctor felt Rose staring at him. Stopping his ministrations, he looked down at her and asked, "What?"

"Are you ever going to go back for Clara?"

A small grin started spreading across his face. Clara; his impossible girl. "Do you want me to?"

"I do like exploring the galaxy with you, love, but right now, I think we both need a break. You realise this is the longest period we've ever travelled together? I told you once that the TARDIS can only handle one psychopath at a time." She stood up and moved to him as she said that.

"But you're _my _psychopath," he returned with a smile. Leaning down, he kissed her lips gently. "What would you do then?"

"Oh, I don't know. I'll find something to do. I may go find Sarah Jane or Wilf."

"Okay. I'll call Clara and see if she'd like a spin out in the old girl. I'll call you when we're done?"

"You'd better, mate."

**HDSGH**

Rose joined the Doctor at the Museum of London after catching up with both Sarah Jane and Wilfred Mott. She was the one who invited Clara to join them for a while and the brunette accepted – if only for a while. The Doctor and Clara filled her in on the adventure she missed, while the Time Lord informed his impossible girl who exactly Rose was to him. Rose was glad that she hadn't been there for when they had met up with the Doctor's past selves: she didn't think she could handle seeing John's face again so soon.

"But you said your wife died," Clara responded. "I met her." When Rose frowned at the younger woman, she clarified. "I mean, I met her data ghost. Whatever that was."

"It would be a data ghost," Rose said. When the Doctor looked at her with confusion, she smiled sweetly at him. "John told me exactly what happened after I allowed CAL to use my memory space."

"I'm sorry, who's John?"

"John Noble was the Doctor's twin. In fact, he was the Doctor at one point, until we faced the Daleks. Do you remember the time when there were all those planets in the sky?"

Clara nodded. "Yeah. I was just a kid though."

"I know the feeling," the blonde said, bounding to the console. "Where are we headed, love?"

"Why don't you surprise us?"

Rose shot the Doctor her tongue and cheek smile before she sent the TARDIS into the vortex. She returned her attention to Clara and the conversation they were having before she got distracted. "Well, it was during that time that a copy of him was made."

"His tenth self."

"You pick up quick."

"Yeah, well, I have seen all of his faces."

Rose smiled again as she bought them into land. "Like I have loved every version of him since the war ended."

"Oi!" the Doctor complained.

"Oh, you love it. And me," Rose shot back.

"You bet I do."

Clara laughed, but felt sadness inside. She, like all of the Doctor's previous companions, had fallen, in some way, with this handsome alien from another planet. But, watching the two of them together, the Doctor and his Rose, she knew that nothing could beat what they had together. So she asked to return home after three months, just because she felt she needed to get back to her 'job'.

So it was back to just being Rose and the Doctor on the TARDIS again.

It wasn't long after that that the call came from what Rose knew to be Trenzalore. She'd recognised the planet as being the same one John had lost his life on in the parallel universe. And it was the same message that her John had received (and eventually translated). When the Doctor noticed her reaction to the planet and the question, he knew she was hiding something from him.

"What is it?" he'd asked.

She remained tight lipped. Rose knew she couldn't bear watching another man die on that planet. The Doctor knew her well enough by then not to push her, because she was so much like him: at the first sign of emotions getting involved, especially with endings, they ran in the opposite direction. So when Clara rang them up and invited them for Christmas dinner, he gave his precious Rose an out. And Rose took it with both her hands. She stayed at Clara's place as the Doctor went swanning off with their friend – to Trenzalore.

**HDSGH**

Clara rested her arm and head on the Doctor's thigh. It had hurt her to see the Doctor looking so old. But he was probably just as hurt to see her without Rose. It had been the same day for her when the Doctor had first come to Trenzalore, but he'd been stuck there for centuries. Protecting the town named Christmas, without anyone really to help him.

"Well, go on. Read it," he said.

"'And now it's time, for one last bow, like all your other selves. The eleven's hour is over now, the clock is striking twelve's,'" Clara read. And it hurt when the Doctor said that he didn't get it. She did – sort of. Her Doctor was dying. It was time for him to go. And it hurt that Rose wasn't even there at the end of it all.

"I don't get it," the Doctor said.

Clara lifted her head up at that and gave him a sad smile. Then she remembered the small disk like object that the TARDIS had given her on the way out. "Doctor, what's this?" she asked, handing the device to him.

His eyes widened. "That's a holorecorder."

Laying the device flat in his hand, he played the message stored on the device. Just above the centre was a small projected image of Rose. "I'm sorry for not being there, my love. I was hurting and afraid, and I took it out on you. Be brave, My Doctor. One final stand. But don't think of this as your last. _We_ will be together again, very soon. Remember your promise, of why you chose the name 'Doctor'. Prove to the universe once again that the Doctor is a wise man. And remember that I love you, no matter what you look like on the outside." The image smiled and then froze.

The Doctor stared at the image of his Rose. He smiled sadly. Closing his fist around the holorecorder, he closed his eyes. He knew what needed to be done, and had known for a while, but until now, he'd lacked the courage.

He stood, and said goodbye to his impossible girl. He wasn't sure what exactly was going to happen, but he knew he needed to face the Daleks one last time. It also meant that he was most likely not going to survive.

"Change it, Doctor. Like Tasha said. Change the future."

"I can't. Not now. I could, once. But there are no more Time Lords left." The Doctor stumbled off, to go answer the summons of the Daleks, leaving his impossible girl behind once again.

And then, she proved to herself just why the Doctor called her his impossible girl: she persuaded the Time Lords to help him. If they loved him, they should help him. Which, to Clara's surprise, they listened to her, and they did what she asked.


	7. Part Five

**Part Five**

Clara looked around the interior of the TARDIS. It had changed from when they'd first arrived in Victorian London. The last few hours had been hard on her. Actually, the last few days, had been hard on her. Granted, her whole relationship with the Doctor was strange. She knew that he changed faces. Deep down, she knew that's what his people did when they were either seriously injured or their bodies wore out. She'd actually had met two of his previous selves and had interacted with his entire time stream, but to actually experience regeneration first hand was scary. Because, even though her impossible life with him, she'd only really gotten to know the 11th Doctor, and to her, he _was_ her Doctor.

"I don't like it," she told this new man, this man that was claiming to be the Doctor.

"I'm not entirely convinced myself. There should be more round things on the wall; there used to be more round things. I wonder where I put them?"

Clara looked down at the console and wondered how she'd ask him to take her back. She didn't know this new man, and wasn't completely certain that she wanted to stay. He got up from where he'd been sitting, and began his decent to the main part of the console room.

"I'm the Doctor," he said. "I've lived for over 2,000 years. Not all of them were good. I've made many mistakes, and it's about time I did something about that."

Clara lowered her eyes. And then looked back at this man, this impossible, mad man with a box. "Like Rose?"

The Doctor froze at that. Rose… He'd left Rose behind when he went to defend Christmas. And he'd promised her that he wouldn't ever leave her behind again. But, hadn't she been the one to leave him to fight his last battle on Trenzalore? Alone?

"She chose to leave me," the Doctor said seriously as he started the TARDIS on her way back to Clara's time. "That was her choice."

Clara shook her head. "She chose not to watch another man she loved grow old and die. She knew you were in your last life and knew that if she went to Trenzalore, she would have to watch you die. Would you have asked anyone to do that? _Especially _when she was only really getting past the _last_ time she'd been to Trenzalore?"

"What would you have me do?"

"I don't know," she admitted. "But do something."

The Doctor frowned, really thinking about what Clara had told him. And then he remembered about how they first met. "Who gave you my number? Do you remember? A very long time ago, you phoned a help line, and you ended up phoning the TARDIS. Who gave you the number?"

Clara looked confused for a second, but realised that abruptly changing the subject was something the Doctor was very good at. "The woman… the woman in the shop."

"Then there's a woman out there who's very keen for us to stay together." He looked her over, and could still see doubt playing over her features. She still wasn't sure of him, of who he was underneath the change, and his attitude to the woman that was his wife. The TARDIS landed and the Doctor braced himself for the possibility that Clara may leave him. "How do you feel about the subject?"

"I'm home."

"If you want to be."

"I'm sorry," Clara whispered. "I'm so, so sorry. But I can't. I don't know you anymore." Her phone rang, and the Doctor, the 12th Doctor, knew who was on the other end. He knew it was him calling in his final moments on Trenzalore.

He waited and then followed her out of the TARDIS. "Will you help me?"

"You shouldn't have been listening."

"I wasn't. I didn't need to. That was me, on the phone." The Doctor was getting a little tired of his companions leaving him after he regenerated. Most didn't know how to handle the 'new' him. Or they had trouble adjusting to the fact that the man they knew him to be wasn't around anymore. Or they just didn't want to see that he was the same man underneath it all. "You can't see me, can you?" He turned from Clara, and saw in the distance a blonde woman talking to a younger version of himself. Turning back to Clara, he continued their conversation. "You look at me and you can't see me." Again, he turned back to look at the other conversation he was having – one he remembered having with Rose nearly 1,000 years before. He saw Rose look over her shoulder and directly at him. His younger self had followed her gaze. What had Rose said to him?

He tried to remember as he told Clara, "Do you have any idea what that's like? I'm not on the phone. I'm right here." Rose hadn't even met this regeneration yet and she had told _him_ that there was only one man she would travel with. "Standing in front of you." There was only one man that Rose would call her husband… But Clara, she couldn't see that. Yet. "Please, please just see me." Rose _hadn't_ even met his new regeneration, but still, she had _already_ accepted him as _her_ Doctor. He was just hoping his impossible girl would see it too.

Clara moved up to him and really studied his face. Eventually, she began to smile. "Thank you," she whispered after a good long moment.

"For what?"

"Phoning." She reached up and hugged him around his neck. He didn't hug her back. Not really.

"I don't really think I'm a hugging person, now," he protested.

"I'm not sure you get a vote," another voice cut in. Clara pulled back from the Doctor and smiled as she saw Rose standing not far from them. "Doctor?"

The Doctor swallowed as he took in the appearance of his impossible Bad Wolf. It had been 700 years since he'd last seen her. 700 long years since she'd asked to be left behind in London. And yet, throughout those long years, he had never stopped thinking of her, and had never stopped loving her. To see her again was a miracle. "Why are we in Cardiff?" he asked.

"Because the TARDIS bought you to where you needed to come," Rose answered. "She knew that you had been here, with Clara, when I talked to a younger version of you."

"How did you get here?"

"Jack found my vortex manipulator." The two of them stared at each other before Rose looked down. "We should get moving before you come over here and work out who you are." Clara looked over at where the other Doctor was kneeling. She looked like she wanted to go over and talk to the younger Doctor. "Clara, he wouldn't know who you are. That Doctor is 300 years younger than the Doctor who first met you." The younger woman nodded slightly before Rose and the Doctor pulled her away. "Let's go get some chips. I've wanted to get some for ages!"

The three of them walked away before Clara thought about the TARDIS. "What about the TARDIS? Wouldn't he know that it's here?" Clara asked.

"The three of us can see the TARDIS," Rose said, "But to everyone else, she's invisible. It's how I knew you were here. I felt her land. The younger Doctor didn't."

"Why?"

"He's too busy trying to work out how Rose Tyler can be back in this world. Or if he had just hallucinated the whole conversation with her," the Doctor said. He looked over his two companions and wondered what Rose really thought of him now. The woman in question felt his eyes on him and she reached out to take a hold of his hand.

"Remember our first date?" she asked him quietly.

He looked down at her and gave her a little half smile. "I took you to the end of the world, and then we had chips."

"You told me that you were the last of your people."

"You told me that I'd always have you." Rose felt her eyes welling up when she heard her promise from so long ago issue out of his mouth. And though she tried to hide it from him, he noticed. He stopped her and gently lifted her chin so he could look into her beautiful hazel eyes. "Hey, what's with the tears?"

Clara had walked a few feet ahead of them and when they stopped, so did she. Turning to look back at them, she couldn't help smiling at the pair of them. She'd gotten to know Rose really well in the three months they'd travelled together after the whole Time War adventure. Rose was a very capable woman who could handle herself in any situation, and hated when other people tried to decide things for her. She'd never willingly accept comfort or help from anyone – except from the man who was offering that very thing.

"I'm sorry. I'm so very sorry. I was so afraid of going back to Trenzalore that I let you go alone. And I wish I could've changed my choice."

The Doctor didn't hesitate in wrapping his arms around his Rose and tucking her head under his chin. He felt one of her arms make its way around his waist as her other hand fisted in his shirt. And though he had said he wasn't a hugger in this body, he thought he could get used to hugging Rose Tyler. Come to think of it, his ninth body (tenth if he included his war self), hadn't been much of a hugger either until this woman in his arms had come along.

"My Bad Wolf, you are forgiven, always and completely forgiven."

Rose smiled, and pulled away from him slightly. With the hand she'd fisted in his shirt, she wiped her cheeks. "You told me that by Lake Silencio."

"It must have been hard for you to face Trenzalore, knowing that I was probably going to my death."

She nodded. "And I didn't want to think about it. So if I stayed in London, I could always imagine that you could come back."

The Doctor smiled. "So, what about those chips?"

"Yeah, I could really go for some chips right about now," Clara piped up. "Doctor, you're buying."

"But I don't have any money."

"Some date you are," Rose laughed. "Alright, Time Lord, Clara, chips are on me."

**HDSGH**

Just before they returned Clara to her correct time with the promise of getting coffee when they returned for her, Rose asked how she was really doing.

"It's strange, you know. Seeing him change. I wasn't sure how to take it at first."

Rose smiled and nodded. "I know exactly what you mean. I was like that when I saw him change the first time. He didn't even tell me what was happening until he was actually regenerating."

"What did you do?"

"I wanted him to change back. After he told me he couldn't, I cried a bit. And then gave myself time to get to know the new him. I knew he was the same man after that."

"So when you saw the Doctor this time?"

"I'd already decided that he was _my_ Doctor. It didn't matter to me what he was like on the outside. He's still the same underneath it all. He still has the same passion and drive to explore and save planets." Rose smiled as Clara took in her words. "Just give yourself some time, and give him a chance. If you're still unhappy after a reasonable time has passed, then we'll leave you. But he really does need your help."

Clara looked confused at that. "Why? He has you."

"Do you know why he travels with others?" Rose asked. Clara shook her head. "It's to help keep him grounded. To remind him of the humanity that's in the world. I won't be able to remind him of that anymore, because I'm like him. I can regenerate, just like he can. And sometimes, I'll forget too and I'll need reminding." Rose smiled and returned to the TARDIS. "We'll both need your help, but we won't force you to join us if you really don't want to travel with us."

"Thanks Rose. For giving me the option."

"It's what friends do."

**HDSGH**

The Doctor looked over at his wife as they made their way around the console. It had been many centuries since he'd had help flying the TARDIS, and he actually appreciated the help. Neither had really spoken since they'd dropped Clara off at her apartment. Once they were safely in flight, he stepped back from the console and asked, "So what do you think?"

Rose looked over at him and really took in his new appearance. "You're older. More dignified. Oh, and not ginger."

He rolled his eyes. What was with the ginger comment? It wasn't like he was obsessed with being ginger. Just because his previous two regenerations had wanted to be ginger, didn't mean _he_ wanted to be ginger now. When he noticed that she was giggling, he tried glaring at her. That made her laugh harder. She knew he couldn't be angry at her forever, and she loved it when he tried.

"At least someone is finding amusement at my expense," he pouted.

"That look doesn't suit you, Doctor."

The Doctor sighed and went to sit down. Rose followed him up to the balcony noticed that there was only one tall, leather bound chair on the balcony surrounding the console unit. Stroking the wall, she mentally asked for another chair to join her Doctor's. She smiled when a comfy lounger appeared close to his. Again, she caught his frown as she sat beside him. "She may be your TARDIS, Doctor, and you are her thief, but I am her heart. You're not going to get rid of me that easily, my Doctor."

"How did you know this was me, back in Cardiff?"

"Because I can feel you, in here," she tapped the side of her head. "I can feel you like all Time Lords or Ladies can when they meet another Time Lord or Lady." Sitting forward on her chair, she leaned over and cupped his cheek and bought his gaze level with hers. "You'll always be my Doctor, no matter what."

He caught hold of her hand and kissed her wrist. "So how did you know that you needed to go back and talk to past me in Cardiff?" He moved their joined hands to the edge of his seat. If he'd allowed her to continue holding his face, he'd get distracted. And right now, he knew he couldn't afford any distractions. Rose allowed her remaining hand to cover his hand that was holding her other hand.

"Because you told me about meeting me there just before I went to the Library. At the time, I didn't know _I _was the Bad Wolf. Kind of ironic, don't you think? I go back to encourage a past you to love a past me."

"What about all those other times I saw you?"

"I figured the Doctor had seen me briefly in 1969, so I arranged just a short stop there so he could see me, before I travelled ahead to get the envelopes from him just before he went to Lake Silencio. And then I found the 10th Doctor's TARDIS from when he was stuck in 1969 with Martha Jones and recorded the message I heard myself say that began the 11th's own journey to 1969. My last stop was Cardiff in 2009, which is when I caught up with you and Clara."

The Doctor looked down at their entwined hands. Rose was too good for him. It had been such a long time, if ever, since someone had done so much for him and had given up so much of herself to see that he was happy.

"What did I do to deserve you?" he asked quietly.

"No one deserves to be alone. You, most of all, my Doctor."

"Is there anything I can do to repay you?"

Rose thought about it. But not for long, because she knew there was something she'd been wanting from the Doctor for the longest time. Ever since she'd told him she'd dreamed of marrying him and he'd said that they would if she lived – that had been just before her second regeneration into River Song. "There is something that I've wanted for the longest time, but I never had the courage to ask for it. I knew it would complicate things back when I was in my third body."

The Doctor looked at her with curiosity. "When I was studying for my doctorate, I found out that the Time Lords were a telepathic race. Of course, I already knew that, after meeting you and the Old Girl. But in my research, I found there was something special that sometimes happened between married couples on your planet." Rose paused for a bit and licked her lips, trying to find the words to express her desire. "John taught me a lot about the telepathy of your race, and told me about the bonding ceremonies. How some could be for just one regeneration and some others were permanent, lasting through all the regenerations of the people bonded together."

He sat up straighter and bought his hand up to her cheek. He couldn't believe what he was hearing, and he was hoping Rose was asking him what he desperately wanted to hear.

"Doctor, John and I shared the lightest of these bonds. Since he's been gone, it's been so lonely in my head. I don't want to be alone any more. I don't want to have a future without you." She swallowed hard and looked straight into his blue, blue eyes. "I want to have that permanent bond with you."

His hearts leapt within his chest. Perhaps Rose didn't know the depth of what she was asking for, but _he_ certainly did. She was asking him to marry her, and to love her, for all time. When he had first asked her to marry him so many years ago, and had forged a light bond with her, he never imagined he would get the bond he most desired from her. It wasn't something that his people did lightly. A permanent bond meant that their lives would be forever bound to the other. There would be no other person in the universe for them.

"Are you sure?" he croaked out.

She nodded. "I'm sure, my Doctor."

He stood up and pulled her up with him. A permanent smile seemed to be plastered on his face. "Then, my Bad Wolf, my Melody Pond, I would gladly have this bond with you." He cupped her cheek and saw the joy he felt mirrored in her eyes. He leaned down and gently placed his lips over hers. Her fingers found the back of his neck and they threaded through the tiny strands of his hair at the nape of his neck. They both sighed with pleasure and as he buried his fingers in her hair, he deepened their kiss.


	8. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

Rose woke up the following day (or was it the following week, she couldn't tell) with the Doctor running his fingers along her spine. She reached out mentally for him, and she heard him sigh with relief – he was like a thirsty man after a drought for anything involving mental contact. It had been so long for him having someone constantly in his mind, and he found that he liked having Rose there.

It was nice that he always had someone to come home to. He'd never have to be alone again. Rose blinked sleepily and rolled onto her side so she could look up at him. He smiled down at her before he placed a butterfly kiss on her bare shoulder.

"This could never grow old," she whispered.

"I don't know about that, love," he whispered back at her. He noticed the smile in her eyes as he'd let out that term of endearment. Tracing her face with his forefinger, the Doctor thought back on the other two times he'd received messages from Rose while in his previous form. "We'll have to go back one more time."

She frowned at him and propped herself up on an elbow. "What do you mean?"

"I remember two other messages you left for me. One I got just after I lost Rory, Amy and you. Just before I met Clara. The other one Clara gave me right before I regenerated. She'd got it from the TARDIS."

Rose smiled, and leaned in to give him a light kiss. "And you're remembering this now?"

"Because I remember me calling you 'love'."

"Well, we don't have to go and do it now, do we?"

The Doctor smiled, and shook his head. He leaned in once again and started planting butterfly kisses all over his wife's face. Wife. He didn't think he'd ever get tired of calling Rose that. It gave him a sense of ownership. But, what warmed his hearts the most was when she called him_ hers. _He smiled and truly looked at the beautiful creature so close to him. A woman that gave him a place to belong. A place to call his own. Because, he knew, he'd been_ hers_ ever since he took her hand and told her 'run'. Just as she'd always been _his_ from the moment, well, for him he wasn't sure _when_ she'd really began to be his.

Maybe it had been from the time when she'd called him 'hot', or from the moment when she'd asked her parents if he was worth it (and he still wasn't sure if he was). Maybe, just maybe, she had been his from the time he'd told the Ponds their daughter would not be fine, she would be amazing.

"Penny for your thoughts, Doctor?"

"What did I do to ever deserve you?"

Rose placed her hand over one of his hearts as she moved to place her ear over his other one. She felt him hitch a breath as she settled into his side. On instinct, his arms wrapped themselves around her, holding her close. "It's one of those things you just have to accept, my Doctor."

He smiled in response and whispered, "Keep reminding me, my Rose. I'm sure to forget." She giggled and nodded against his chest. Life couldn't get more perfect than this, could it?


	9. Author's Note

Okay, there is a sequel in the works for this story. It's called **Never Too Late** and can be found through my profile.


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